Many of you are probably familiar with the Bechdel Test, named after Alison Bechdel, and originally posited by Liz Wallace. The test simply asks whether a movie meets the following criteria:

(1) It has at least two women in it, who (2) talk to each other, about (3) something besides a man.

The rule works with written fiction too, and can be applied to more than just gender. For example, The Stepsister Scheme passes the test with flying colors, but if you ask whether there are at least two nonwhite characters who talk to each other … well, no. Likewise, it fails if you apply it to visibly lesbian/gay characters.

Red Hood’s Revenge, on the other hand, passes all three of those permutations of the test. Yay, I win at Bechdel, right?

Now let’s time how long it takes someone to point out that the series fails the test miserably when applied to men. There are more than two male characters, but I don’t know that they ever talk to one another, and if so, I doubt it’s about anything except our heroines.

BECHDELFAIL!

So does this mean I should add a pair of male sidekicks? Maybe goblin males, who can chat about the finer points of barbequeued knight? The armor holds in the juices … okay, actually that sounds like fun. But I’m gonna say no.

The point isn’t that a “good” story must be like Noah’s ark, having at least two of every character variant. To me, the test is a way to illustrate how few stories actually have multiple female characters, and if so, they’re often present simply as “accessories” to our male heroes.

I don’t worry that my books fail the test when applied to men, mostly because I can’t remember the last book I read that didn’t pass the “Male Bechdel Test” … but I could give you a long list of books that fail when applied to women, to LGBT characters, to nonwhite characters…

It’s an awareness thing. It’s something I think we need to be more conscious of, both as readers and as writers. Stepsister Scheme has only a single non-white human character. Was that a deliberate choice, or did I simply use white as the (lazy) default?

Or take the zombie story I just sold, for example — those characters were white because I had a week to write the story, and I didn’t bother to think about it. I just defaulted to white. (Okay, more of a grayish tinge actually, but still.)

Was I wrong to make them white? Should I have made them black or Native American or Inuit or something else? Not necessarily … there might be valid reasons why most of the zombies in that situation and location would be white. But as the writer, that should have been a conscious decision on my part, not a default.

17 Comments

Did you actually describe the zombies as White, or did you just fail to describe them as anything other than? Seeing them as white in your head isn’t the same as translating that to paper. I don’t see failing to point out the color of the character’s skin as a problem – it leaves that aspect open to the interpretation of the reader.

I tend to think that whites would be more susceptible to zombieism anyway, at least based on what we see from Madison Avenue…

SewickedJul 14, 2010 @ 10:32:55

All things considered, are they really white or just unspecified? Or racially mixed but not displaying ethnic markers? As a comparison, if you briefly describe my cousin and my assistant, you wouldn’t know which one was ‘white’ and which one was ‘of color’. One is of Middle Eastern/N. European descent and she tans quite dark, has dark eyes and black hair. The other one is of African/American Indian descent, she straightens her black hair, has dark skin and dark eyes.

Both come from suburban, middle class, Southern backgrounds. They have more in common with each other than with someone from a rural Midwest background.

However, at least in this society, when reading we tend to default to white. I.e., if you write a “colorblind” story without ever describing characters’ race or skin, readers tend to assume they’re white unless given pretty strong clues to the contrary. Meaning if you care about trying to write a more varied cast of characters, you need to be more explicit about it. Does that make sense?

It seems the Bechdel Test needs a corollary:
4) Are the two characters not stereotypes?

It is nice to pass the test, but not if the characters are cardboard cutouts or offensive stereotypes. If the only LGBT characters in the story are “Flaming Queens” or “Butch Lesbians” I don’t think it should pass the test. It would be like putting in two African American characters who speak in 80’s ebonics with huge afros and hair picks, or Native Americans wearing war paint and saying “How!” when greeting people.

It is far more important the characters be well written than diverse. I think that is where your books have really excelled. The characters are real, their ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, etc. do not define who they are.

Thanks, Bill. And absolutely they need to be more than cardboard cliches.

I think the Bechdel Test works well as a simple tool for showing underrepresentation, but passing the test certainly doesn’t mean the story got everything “right”…

Bill PearsonJul 14, 2010 @ 10:40:10

I suppose the real question is if race matters in the story. A. Lee Martinez was saying the couple in his latest book Divine Misfortune were African American in his mind. He specifically did not include any clues to their race in the story as it should not matter. Somehow I don’t think you care what race the zombie belonged to… just that it is trying to gnaw at your skull. 🙂

I’d say yes and no. In this case, the zombies were the good guys, so there was minimal brain-eating 🙂 Is race an important plot point? Not at all. And since I didn’t explicitly describe it, I could announce here that all four members of my zombie team are nonwhite.

But it’s not on the page, and readers are going to read them as white.

I’m not saying these are rules that every writer must follow, or else! But one of the strengths of the Bechdel Test is it makes it apparent just how underrepresented certain groups are in fiction. I think that’s important to be aware of when writing, and at least in terms of race, failing to describe the characters generally does nothing to change that underrepresentation for your readers.

Anita KendallJul 14, 2010 @ 11:36:49

I can’t really speak to race issues, being in the majority myself. However, as a lesbian, I don’t necessarily think I need all or even most books to meet the gay Bechdel test; I certainly don’t like feeling invisible or written off, but it is reality that most people are not gay and for most of my life my life couldn’t have met the test. And I really hate being told that a character is gay when that doesn’t have any bearing on their character as it relates to the story. For me it is like telling me that their favorite food is strawberries. Unless it affects the story/their personality/their interaction with the world and with others, I find it extraneous (if sometimes interesting).

As both a woman and a gay person, I have a strong dislike of characters that are female or gay when the writer doesn’t have a clue what they’re writing about. Not that you have to be female or gay to write those well; you do a great job with both, for example. Just that I would rather have a good book that doesn’t meet the test, than a poorly written one that does. (In other words, I would rather have Tolkien than… can’t think of any examples I want to single out right now… guess that analogy fell rather flat.)

I had an interesting experience recently, regarding the default to white in absence of description. I’ve been a Heinlein fan for a long while, and there are several stories where he makes plain well into the plot– sometimes as late as the end, as in Starship Troopers– that a character is not white. Even so, I tend to assume his characters are white… so when I was listening to an audiobook version of Stranger in a Strange Land, I was shocked to hear Jubal played as black. He’s never described, so I’d always pictured him as white. It doesn’t change anything to now think of him as black, but it was interesting to note how shocked I was.

athliosJul 15, 2010 @ 00:33:00

I was thinking about this after reading your post earlier today, and it occurred to me that the Bechdel Test could be difficult for stories that rely heavily on a single (male) POV, especially ones written from a first person perspective. Do the two women have to only be talking to each other? Can a male be present? Involved? Do three people, two female and one male, discussing something unrelated to “a man” pass the test? Does the conversation have to occur “on camera”, so to speak?

I was trying to apply the test to The Dresden Files specifically, and while there were at least 7 or so recurring female characters that I could recall at that moment, and I know they spoke to each other about things that weren’t “a man”, Harry would have had to have been present for us to be aware of a conversation. If he’s elsewhere or unconscious the audience simply isn’t going to witness it. This would be an even bigger issue for first-person POV stories with a male narrator/protagonist. I mean, we can assume that the mother/daughter pair had many and various conversations Harry (and therefore the audience) were never privy to, and that at least some of them (Molly is a teen girl, after all) weren’t about boys/men, but do they count for the test? This is about where my thought processes ran aground, so I figured I’d ask your opinion.

I understand the purpose of the test, and I think it’s application can make a very good point about female/GLBT/non-white presences in any sort of fiction, but it just might not be the most . . . robust of tools.

I think I’d agree with you if I thought the point was for all stories to pass the test. But like I said above, I don’t believe that’s the point. I thought Iron Man was an awesome movie, and it failed the Bechdel Test. That failure doesn’t mean it’s a bad movie … but then you take a broader look at just how many movies fail.

Likewise, the Dresden books fail the test, based on what you’re saying. Sure, we can assume things occur off camera, but the point is that the book is about the male hero, told from the male hero’s point of view, and those other conversations and interactions aren’t important enough to include on the page.

That doesn’t mean they’re bad books. That doesn’t mean they necessarily should have been written any differently. But it does mean they’re part of a much larger trend of focussing on the white male heroes.

DavidJul 16, 2010 @ 14:42:17

Sometimes there is no better tutor than irony.

I’m about halfway into my first attempt at writing fantasy novel and, though I have made a conscious effort to include prominent female protagonists, including characters that are queer and non-white, my novel does not yet pass the Bechdel Test or any of its variations.

As Jim has said, I think it’s informative and worth contemplating that so much of our popular entertainment relies on the narrative of white male ascencion with the occasional addition of a plucky female protagonist who, though tough in her own way (viz. the new Prince of Persia), is ultimately grounded in her existence through love for the male hero. That she so often does not get even a single scene to discuss something of personal importance to her with another female is a really fascinating phenomenon and, in my opinion, very telling about what kind of culture we (still) live in.

Though I know that in subsequent books of the series (if I make it that far), I’ll have scenes that pass the Bechdel Test, it was good to be reminded – all unawares on my end – how anchored my female protagonist was to the males in her life.

I’m a relatively new reader and, this being my first post, I’d like to take the chance to say that I enjoy your (Jim’s) work immensely! I think it’s wonderful that you have a small community setting set up here where you can interact directly with your fans. I’m currently reading The Stepsister Scheme and I very much look forward to the rest of the series.

Sorry I didn’t answer this sooner, and thanks for the kind words about the books and the blog both 🙂

Like you say, I think it’s a good thing to think about and be aware of. I don’t think passing the test should dictate how you write a story, but if it gets people to think a little more deeply about what they’re writing/reading/watching, then that’s a good thing.

HazelJul 30, 2010 @ 12:56:31

I agree that it is an awareness thing. Like someone mentioned before, being a lesbian myself, I do not want a stereotype of myself either in a book. I am very surprised that you even thought to make one of the characters gay. Was that something that was planned or was it something you were aware of that was missing in the fantasy area? I actually am reading Red Hood’s Revenge right now (not knowing there were two other books before..oops) and was so surprised by how well you handled all three female protagonists. I have been into fantasy all my life and it’s wonderful to feel represented finally in a good quality book. Can’t wait to read the two others.

Thank you! If I did it right, you should be able to read Red Hood without having read the first two, and you shouldn’t get *too* lost 🙂

I actually had to open up my first outline from 2005 to make sure my memory was correct, but there’s a note in the outline about making Talia a lesbian, so that’s been there pretty much from day one. I’m having a hard time saying exactly why I made that choice, except that it felt right, both for the character and for the kind of story I wanted to tell.